It's Monday! What are you Reading?

Thank you Jen and Kellee for hosting this weekly!  To see what others are reading and recommending, or to participate, be sure to check out their blog Teach Mentor Texts :)

Here are some of my favorites from this week: 

I was excited to come across Edgar Allan Poe's Pie: Math Puzzlers in Classic Poems by J. Patrick Lewis.  I am not known as a "math person" at all - literacy is definitely my passion, but I am working hard this year to try to get more excited about math.  This book is a perfect segue into working on my math goal since this is a poetry book too!  Each page displays a math puzzle embedded inside of a poem with colorful illustrations and the answers on the bottom of the pages.  I plan on hanging up a poem puzzle each morning and giving students all day to try to solve the puzzle by putting their name/solution on a post-it and attaching to the poem display. At the end of the day, during our closing circle, we will discuss our solutions and unveil the answer. 

Sky Boys: How they built the Empire State Building by Deborah Hopkinson is a perfect companion text to Pop's Bridge by Eve Bunting.  Each year, I read Pop's Bridge during our character unit and now I will also read aloud Sky Boys and model thinking across the two texts.  Both texts show the importance of working together as a team to achieve goals and dreams.  

I am always looking for mentor texts to use for informational writing and this is a perfect series to use to study craft in informational writing.  VIP Pass to a Pro Baseball Game Day by Clay Latimer is part of the Sports Illustrated Kids: Game Day series.  I am a baseball fan (Yankees, of course!) so I enjoyed reading about the "behind the scenes" action we don't see watching the games - the pre-game and post-game action.  I learned many new facts about the umpires, coaches, and groundskeeper along with information about the bullpen, dugout, and the clubhouse.  I know this will be a favorite series in my classroom this year! 

I also read Smarter Charts by Marjorie Martinelli and Kristi Mraz this past weekend.  I am extremely passionate about the importance of using purposeful charts in our classrooms and follow Chartchums blog on a regular basis, so I looked forward to reading their new book.  Smarter Charts is for grades K-2, but the philosophy behind making meaningful charts can be applied to any grade level.  If you have not checked out their Chartchums blog yet, definitely head over there soon and be sure to add this book to your TBR stack if you haven't yet! :)


This week I am reading The Digital Writing Workshop by Troy Hicks and Energize Research Reading and Writing by Christopher Lehman - so excited to read both!

Happy Reading! :)